Thursday, December 5, 2013

Next, I'm in the author spotlight on the lovely Biblio Belles Book Blog! Check it out for a Speak Easy teaser and a chance to win a signed copy, signed bookmarks, and an eBook of Unwrapped, the NAturals' novella collection out December 23rd!

Finally, here is a sexy scene from Speak Low--no spoilers, promise!

“Come with me.”

Joey’s words floated toward me through the dark, whispered
in a low voice, raw with need. Masculine scents of smoke and whiskey and
aftershave filled my head, and I breathed deeply before a sigh escaped my lips.
Then his mouth was on mine, hot and hard and heavy. Too heavy.

Joey, I won’t fight you. Take me away.

I tried to murmur words against his lips, but the pressure
on my mouth wouldn’t let up. I’m dreaming,
I thought in a haze of confused arousal.

But when I opened my eyes, the man in my room was real.

And it wasn’t Joey.

“Shhhh,” Enzo whispered, his hand over my mouth. “Come with
me. Now.”

My pulse, already racing, kicked up even higher at his
invitation, at his touch on my lips, at the promise of sneaking somewhere alone
with him in the dark. Clothed in only my light summer nightgown, I followed him
past my father’s closed bedroom door, carefully moving down the stairs in my
bare feet. It didn’t surprise me at all that Enzo had come right in the front
door—he had a way with locks I’d learned not to question.

Outside, I hurried toward a gorgeous cream-colored Packard
sedan parked at the curb. Enzo opened the passenger door for me and I slid in,
tucking my hands underneath my legs. As I watched his lean, muscular frame move
around the front of the car and open the driver’s side door, my insides
tightened with desire. He wore no coat, no vest, and no collar on his white
shirt. The top few buttons were undone, and my fingers itched to pull the shirt
from his trousers and undo the rest of them so I could work off some of the
tension inside me. I dug my fingernails into my thighs.

As soon as the motor was running Enzo hit the accelerator,
speeding down the street and turning onto Jefferson so quickly I had to brace
myself against the door. My heart thrummed hard in my chest. Neither of us
spoke, but when his right hand slid across the seat and under the hem of my
short nightgown, I moved closer to him.

His expression remained impassive and his eyes on the road,
although I saw the slightest twitch in his jaw. I held my breath when his hand
settled on the inside of my thigh and slowly crept higher. When his fingers
brushed against the soft folds between my legs and he realized I wasn’t wearing
underwear, he glanced sharply at me.

My eyes pleaded with him to continue. I wanted to lose
control, lose my mind, lose myself. I wanted the heart-pounding abandon that
overwhelmed us when we let ourselves forget who we were and why every moment
between us was stolen. Ten days ago I hadn’t even known his name, but he’d
awakened something in me, something instinctual and insatiable that would not
be ignored.

And I didn’t want to ignore it. I wanted to indulge it—now.

With my eyes locked on the exquisite lines of his profile,
I put my left hand between his legs. His cock was already hard, but as I rubbed
him up and down, it swelled further and strained tighter against his trousers.
He slipped a fingertip inside me, sliding it up the slick seam at my center,
keeping it torturously shallow, before moving it gently back and forth over the
tiny spot that electrified my entire body.

With one hand I slipped the buttons of his trousers through
the holes and slid my palm down his hot, tight abdomen. When I wrapped my hand
around his solid flesh, he grabbed the steering wheel with both hands.

I said nothing, just moved my hand up and down the hot,
thick column, squeezing tight and keeping the rhythm steady, the way I knew he
liked it. My lips curved into a smile. The thrill of touching Enzo this way
filled me with a sense of power and freedom so intoxicating I often felt drunk
when we were together, even when no alcohol had been consumed. The forward
motion of the car, the rush of night flying past the windows, the hum of the
tires on the road—all of it added to the maelstrom building inside me.

Suddenly the Packard swerved. At first I thought it was
accidental, but then I saw that Enzo had turned down a silent residential
street with large homes set back from the road. He turned off the engine,
looked at me with glittering black eyes, and uttered just one word: “Now.”

The keys barely hit the floor before he hauled me onto his
lap.

I straddled him, one knee on either side of his hips, and
he took my head in his hands, crushing his mouth to mine. We weren’t in love,
about that I had no illusions, but our desire for each other was volatile and
fierce, and we kissed as if we were starved, as if our hunger could never be
satisfied. Enzo slipped his arms from his braces and I shoved at the sides of
his trousers. Without taking his mouth off me, he lifted his hips and managed
to shimmy them down just enough. I grasped his swollen cock in my hand again,
anxious to feel it inside me.

But we’d already been careless once the night before.
“Wait,” I breathed. Do you have…you know…”

Without answering, he tilted sideways and reached under the
front seat. When he righted himself, he held a small condom tin, and with one
hand, he opened it, slipped one from its paper wrapper, and slid it on.

I lowered myself onto him, intending to go slow since I was
still tender from the night before. But Enzo had other ideas. He grabbed my
hips and yanked me down hard, both of us gasping at the shock of it. Bracing my
hands on the top of the seat behind him, I turned my face away from his and
kept still, allowing my body to push past the sharp twinge of pain.

His mouth, hot and wet, traveled down the exposed side of
my neck as the ache inside me eased. He swirled his tongue in an intricate
pattern along my throat and down to my shoulder. Instinctively, the muscles
surrounding him contracted, and I gasped when I felt his teeth sink into my
skin. Then he brushed his lips over the spot, soft as a feather.

Aroused by the whisper of his lips on my neck after the
sting of the bite, I began to move, slowly rocking my hips forward and back,
and clenching him tight inside me. He picked up his head and our eyes met, our
mouths open and breathing hotly against one another.

Then he took control of the rhythm between us, using his
hands on my hips, pulling and pushing my body against his, increasingly harder
and faster. He cursed and closed his eyes while I smiled and reached up,
flattening my palms on the car’s ceiling. I let him move me the way he wanted,
but I arched my back a little to feel the base of his cock just where I wanted
it. A sheen of sweat broke out on his forehead, glistening in the dark, and my
back prickled with trapped heat under my nightgown.

Oh my God. Yes, yes, yes…

Pressure built inside me, the powerful need for release a
gathering storm at my center, and I wanted to widen my knees even farther to
take him deeper. My blood roared, my skin hummed, and every muscle in my body
began to tighten.

He cursed again, and I could feel him start to throb inside
me. He dug his fingers into my skin and held me tight to him as he came, and
the sight of his gorgeous face and the pulse of his powerful orgasm and even the
knowledge that we could be seen through the windows sent me flying over the
edge of my own pleasure. I closed my eyes, dropped my head back, and let the
waves crash through me.

Breathing hard, I stared at the ceiling of the car as stars
swam in front of my eyes. Enzo touched my throat, trailing five fingers down to
my chest. “I want you,” he growled.

I laughed lazily, picking my head up. “Again? Already?”

He didn’t smile. “I want you for myself.” His palm
flattened over one breast and he squeezed it before sliding his hand to the
small of my back. “I don’t want anyone else to have what I have.”

My body was still tingling, but his words abraded the
lingering hum a little. I wasn’t interested in being anyone’s possession.

And Enzo had no room to talk.

“You’re the one with the fiancée, not me.”

“I told you last night—that’s a business arrangement.”

“I remember.” Irritated at the thought of the squeaking
little chippie he was engaged to marry, I tried to get off his lap, but he held
me there. His flesh was still relatively hard inside me, but I was no longer in
the mood.

“Jealous?”

“No.” But my cheeks were burning. “I just don’t like being
reminded of your goddamn girlfriend while I’m sitting on your lap.”

“That’s more than just my lap you’re on, isn’t it?”

“Stop it. You know what I mean. Here you are talking about
not wanting others to have me, but I don’t even know when we can see each
other, between my father and your fiancée, and—”

“Your father won’t be a problem. He’ll be so busy with his
new business venture, he won’t even notice you’re gone.”

“New business venture…you mean the new building?”

“And the gambling. I set that up, you know.”

I blinked in surprise. “Your father let you do that?”

“I’m a grown man, Tiny. My father doesn’t control me.”
Anger edged its way underneath his words.

“Sorry, but I thought it was Angel who’d made the deal with
my father today. He never said anything about you.”

“Well, I was there,” he said, irritated. “It was my idea to
move Jack to a new building, let him run a few games, and let Raymond take over
the bootlegging from Canada on his own.”

At the mention of his brother, I froze. “Raymond was
there?”

Enzo smiled. “No, he’s still recovering from the wrath of
Tiny O’Mara.”

In my mind I relived the adrenaline-and-terror-fueled blow
to his head. I felt no guilt, but I did fear further violence. “Is he going to
come after me again?”

“If he does, he’ll have me to answer to.”

“But he’s your brother.”

“I don’t fucking care who he is—anyone touches you, anyone
even looks at you in a way I don’t like, I’ll kill him.”

Unease slithered up my body, wrapping itself around my
chest like a boa constrictor. I tried to shake it off and speak lightly. “So it’s OK for you to have a fiancée,
but no one can even look my way?”

“You know, if your friends hadn’t stolen that shipment, I
wouldn’t be in this position. I could probably even break it off with Gina.”

I raised an eyebrow. This was something new. Yesterday when
I’d confronted him about the engagement, he hadn’t said anything about leaving
Gina Meloni, whose father owned a whiskey distillery in Kentucky. “Oh?”

“But now I can’t postpone anything until I pay for the
fucking whiskey I ordered. It’s in Meloni’s warehouse, but he won’t deliver it
until I pay him. And his men won’t let anyone else deliver booze to the club,
which is a big fucking problem, as you might imagine.”

I didn’t much care about his whisky problem. “Postpone
what? I thought you were already engaged.” I tried to recall a ring on Gina’s
finger, but couldn’t. The couple times I’d seen her at the club, I hadn’t known
about the engagement so I hadn’t thought to look for one.

Enzo turned his head and stared out the window. “I asked
her father for more time to get the cash for the whiskey, and he offered a
deal.”

“What kind of deal?”

“If Gina and I get married now, he’ll forgive the debt.”

The irony that it was now Enzo forced to come up with
thousands of dollars on a deadline wasn’t lost on me, but I couldn’t help
obsessing over the word married, especially
in light of our intimate seating arrangement. “Wait a minute…you’re actually
going to marry her?”

“I’m trying to get out of it.”

My mouth fell open “Jesus Christ, Enzo!” This time when I
wrestled my way off his lap, he didn’t stop me.

“What’s the problem, Tiny? It’s not as if you didn’t know
about her. We discussed the fact that you and I are a secret, remember? That’s
half the fun.”

We had discussed it,
sort of—actually it was less a discussion and more his telling me how things
had to be. If I wanted him, those were the terms. And while the secrecy did add
a certain clandestine thrill to our meetings, I wasn’t sure I wanted to be a
married man’s mistress. Frowning, I looked away as he removed the spent condom.

“Listen to me,” he said. “Gina’s not important. What
matters is that I can’t let Meloni see I can be bested by a bunch of fucking
upstart delinquents from the Scarfone gang. He’ll make my life hell. He’ll
think he can push me around. That’s why I have to go after them myself. Forget
what I told you about talking to Lupo.”

At the mention of Joey, I froze. “What?”

“I need to handle this now. I can’t wait around and hope
that he tells you something.”

“Can’t you just ask your father for the money?”

“I’m not a fucking child, Tiny. I can handle this myself.”

“So now what?”
Pressing my knees together, I pushed my nightgown down and tucked it around my
legs. My thighs were sticky.

“So now I get my money back from those assholes. I can’t
let it be known that you can steal from Enzo DiFiore. I have to send a
message.”

Chills swept down my arms. “How?”

He set his jaw and didn’t answer, but I knew what he was
thinking. My stomach heaved, imagining it could be Joey on the receiving end of
that message. “Don’t, Enzo. You don’t have to hurt anyone—let me help you.”

“You can’t help me.”

“Yes, I can.” What are you doing? a voice inside me screamed.

But I ignored it.

“The River Gang didn’t sell the opium. Joey brought it back
to Detroit.” I whispered the words, as if the volume at which I betrayed Joey
might lessen its reprehensibility.

Enzo fixed his eyes on me. “What? Who told you that?”

“Joey wants to talk to you. Maybe make a deal with you.”
The words tumbled out quickly.

“Where is it?”

Finally I bit my tongue. “I don’t know.”

“Oh, I think you do.” He leaned closer, slipping his arms
around me and dragging me across his lap on my back. My legs extended along the
seat, and I pressed my knees together as his right hand slid under my nightgown
again. “And you’re going to tell me.”

“Enzo, please.”

He kneaded my thigh, but his touch was gentle, too gentle
for how I knew he must be feeling inside. And he was smiling. “Tell me,
darling.”

I chewed my bottom lip as his eyes searched my face.
Despite his warm hands on me, the curve of his lips was as chilling as the calm
in his voice. It was the Enzo I’d first met, the one who could mask his
emotions so masterfully that I couldn’t tell what he was thinking. He’d let
some of that façade slip in the last few days. But now there’s something he
wants more than you. “I can’t.”

His smile widened as his fingers slid higher and worked
between my inner thighs. “You can do anything you want,” he said softly,
bringing his lips close to mine as he began to stroke me. “You’re still wet. I
love that I make you this wet.” Lowering his mouth, he slid his tongue between
my lips and eased one finger, then another, inside me, his languid kiss
mirroring the gentle rhythm of his hand.

Somewhere inside my brain was a voice warning me that this
was wrong, that I’d made a promise to Joey, that Enzo wasn’t kissing me this
way because he cared for me. But I silenced it by telling myself I’d done the
right thing by revealing Joey’s secret—I’d prevented Enzo from hurting anyone.
And even if Enzo didn’t love me, he certainly loved pleasing me, and maybe that
was enough. As his tongue swept mine, my arms snaked around his neck and I
widened my knees a little.

“Oh God…” I clutched at his neck and turned my face into
his chest, but even the smell of him, smoky and masculine, drove me mad with
desire.

He rubbed his wet fingers over the most sensitive skin on
my body. “I know everything you want. And I can give it all to you, you know I
can.” His voice was dulcet, the words dripping from his lips like honey. “Your
own apartment, money to do as you please, new clothes…the life you deserve.
I’ve been thinking about it all day.”

When I moaned, he rubbed faster and harder, and I could
only think yes, yes, yes. I murmured the
words, and he brought his lips closer to my ear.

“Wouldn’t you like your own place? Where we can be together
whenever we want? I’ll make you come all…night…long.”

His breath tickled my skin, his words echoing through the
roar of blood and the buzz of nerve endings and—oh my God the way he touched me made me feel like nothing else
mattered but the moment and the need and the heat and the spiraling climb
toward release…

“Yes!” I cried out, lifting my hips against his hand as the
second orgasm exploded inside me, no less powerful than the first. When the
tightness finally eased, my bones were floating in my skin.

“Mmmmm.” He kissed me again. “You’ll need an apartment that
has thick walls.”

I managed a tiny smile.

“So what do you say?”

“I…can’t
afford an apartment.”

“I’ll pay for it.”

“No.” Orgasms aside, I didn’t want to him to own me.

“Then I’ll get you a job. Would you like to work at the
club?”

“Work at the club? What would I do?”

“Whatever you want. Hostess? Hat check? Waitress?” He
cocked his head. “You don’t sing, do you? Or dance? You’d look fantastic on
stage in a short little costume.”

“Uh, no.” Because one of my legs was slightly shorter than
the other, the result of a difficult birth during which my hip was broken, I’d
never felt terribly natural while dancing—sometimes even walking comfortably
was a chore. And my singing made my cooking skills look good.

“Well, you can think about it then. But I’ll see to it that
you’re paid very well, if you want.”

I exhaled, closing my eyes. Of course I wanted it. I wanted
everything he just mentioned—the apartment, the nights with him, the money to
do as I pleased, the freedom to make my choices and own my mistakes as well as
my successes. What young woman didn’t want to live a flapper’s life with all
its wicked delights?

But at what price?

If I told Enzo where the opium was and he took it back,
Joey would know I’d betrayed him. But if I didn’t, Enzo would take matters into
his own hands and people would get hurt, maybe even killed.

I opened my eyes. “If I tell you where the opium is, you
have to promise me you’ll give me a chance to talk to Joey before you take it.”

“I can’t promise that, Tiny. But I can promise that if you don’t tell me, I’ll have no choice but to settle this
score my own way.”

My heart stuttered. “Well…you can’t hurt Joey. Promise
that.”

Enzo stiffened. “What is he to you?”

“A friend.”

Silence. “I won’t have to hurt him if he cooperates. And I
won’t have to marry Gina if I get the cash for the drugs.”

It was so dark, I couldn’t read his eyes. I wanted
everything he was offering. And I didn’t want him to marry Gina. What had he
said to me this morning? You and I are going to have to trust each other a
little bit.

I took a breath. “It’s in the boathouse.”

A smile crept onto his lips, slow and sinister. “Shall we
take a ride?”

I struggled to sit up. “No!”

He shifted me onto the seat beside him and started the car.

Panicked, I put my hands on his arm and tugged. “Please,
Enzo. Just wait, all right?” It occurred to me that I wasn’t entirely positive
the drugs were still in the boathouse. Even if they had been there earlier
today, Joey might have moved them after dropping me off. I hung on as he swung
the car around and headed back onto Jefferson. “Listen, I wasn’t supposed to
tell you anything yet, and now I’ll be in trouble.”

Tuesday, November 19, 2013

I'm so exited to reveal this cover today, not only because I love it so much (it's the same designer who did Speak Easy and Speak Low!) but because it's the first official collaboration between me and my five dearest writing friends.

We each provided a short story for this book, so you're getting six novellas PLUS the hot little story we co-wrote last summer, The Boy Next Door. The stories in Unwrapped are a little of everything but a whole lot of sexy and fun.

What's my contribution about? Well, it's called Three to Tango, and it's about a shy, romance novel-obsessed girl named Caroline who learns to channel her inner smut goddess after a sexy tango lesson with Nicolas, a hot foreign instructor--and his gorgeous partner, Valentina.

More about that later! For now...

COVER REVEAL

A New Adult Romance

Six different novellas

by the NAturals

Laurelin Paige, Gennifer Albin, Melanie Harlow,

Sierra Simone, Kayti McGee Downey, and Tamara Mataya

Release: December 23, 2013

Cover designed by Tom Barnes Design

Six romance authors present six very different novellas in this anthology of new stories: Ménage a tango lessons. A bride DYING to say, 'I don't.' A horny college boy at a purity rally. Time-traveling graduate students meet Victorian playboys. A rugby player who's as dirty off the field as on. And kissing under the mistletoe with a Scottish exchange student. Something for everyone, the NAturals present sweet, funny, and erotic tales of new adults meant to be Unwrapped all year long and not just at Christmas.
About the Authors
Laurelin Paige, Gennifer Albin, Melanie Harlow, Sierra Simone, Kayti McGee Downey, and Tamara Mataya are the six authors who blog for TheNaturalAuthors.blogspot.com. They each write romance and adore pushing the boundaries of the genre. Above all, they love reading smut, looking at pictures of hot men, and making up names for the band they’re always talking about forming.
Blog | Facebook | Twitter

Monday, November 4, 2013

I didn't know the author personally. In fact, I had never even heard of M. Pierce or Night Owl. But I was aggravated by something Pierce said in a blog post about the way authors price their ebooks.

And I was fist-clenching, teeth-gritting jealous.

This was an author who came out of nowhere with a debut novel that rocketed to the top ten in the Kindle store pretty fast. Reviews of Night Owl are amazing.

I was convinced M. Pierce was a pen name for an established author or an agent. One who had connections. One who had a built-in fan base. Or maybe a Big Name to blurb the book. In other words, M. Pierce wasn't starting at the bottom, like me.

So I got the free sample on Kindle (yes, I'm cheap) and started reading, hoping that the writing would be bad, the editing shoddy, the smut recycled from every other alpha male book out there right now. Then, I reasoned, I would not feel so bad that I do not sell a million books a day. Because at least I know how to use punctuation.

I poured a glass of wine, gave a final harrumph, and started to read.

Two pages in, I was hooked. And furious.

How DARE Night Owl be so fucking good? How DARE M. Pierce write so well? How DARE the characters be so interesting, the setup so intriguing, the smut so hot?

As I read on, I was even more convinced that M. Pierce was a fake name for a big author who wanted to write erotica anonymously. The writing was too confident, too sharp, too unapologetic. Cocky, even--but in a good way. No fumbling, frilly prose or shifts in verb tense. No misuse of apostrophes. No excessive dialog tags choking the characters' conversations.

I. Was. So. Mad.

The next morning, I stalked M. Pierce's blog like a hawk, determined to figure out if he or she was really Stephen King. (Not gonna lie, that's really what I thought.)

Imagine my surprise to discover it's really just a fantastic, hard-working writer who wrote a good book that took off. And that M. Pierce is funny, honest, self-deprecating, and generous with advice to other indie authors.

Damn, that's annoying.

I felt horrible. And guilty. So I wrote Pierce an email saying how much I was enjoying Night Owl and admitting that I'd hoped it wouldn't be as good as everyone said it was. I even confessed my stalkerish behavior.

And then, AND THEN, to make me feel even worse, I get an awesome email back, and we've since struck up a nice conversation about writing and publishing and other random things.

I can't wait to finish Night Owl, and if you like well-written erotic romance, I urge you to pick it up--you'll love the fresh twists on the genre, and the sexytimes are just as hot as anything I've read. Matt, one of the two main characters, is completely under my skin today. He's actually not all that likable in many ways, and it's a credit to Pierce that I kind of can't get enough of him.

I wanted to dislike the author and the book. Serves me right that they are both amazing.

Isabelle is content being a maid, and will do
anything for her lady, even accompany her to a masquerade ball. Lady Theodosia
needs extra support and encouragement on this night, for tomorrow she will meet
the man her parents have pledged her to.Isabelle has never had occasion to attend such
an event, and is at first ill at ease. But meeting an enchanting young man
during the course of the evening makes her wish for a life she can never have.
Thinking she will never see him again, she returns his flirtation and even
reveals her face. Imagine her shock when he shows up the next morning,
announcing his claim on Lady Thedosia.Isabelle does all she can to avoid Lord Adrian
Wingave, but then he not only sees her, he recognizes her. To make matters
worse, Isabelle fears her feelings are not one-sided. Torn between duty and
desire, Isabelle hopes for something more this Christmas.Add to Goodreads!

1) Nicole, what inspired you to write Masked Love?

I've
always thought of Christmas as a magical time, just perfect for falling
in love. I'd been wanting to write a Christmas romance for awhile. I
had just finished writing a steampunk romance (which is in the middle of
a rewrite) and that was my first venture into the Victorian era. I
decided I wanted to try yet another time period, since I love research,
and picked Regency. From there, I added a masquerade ball and I was off
to the keyboard.

2) Do you have a Masked Love playlist? If Isabelle and Lord Adrian had a song, what would it be?

Since
I wrote Masked Love not even close to the Christmas season, I actually
listen to a lot of Christmas music to get me into the mood. Hark the
Harold Angles Sing, Here We Go A-Wassailing, and the like.

Isabelle and Lord Adrian's song would be "I Won't Give
Up" by Jason Mraz. The beginning is fitting for their first meeting:
When I look into your eyes, it's like watching the night sky or a
beautiful sunrise.

And the chorus for the rest of the story: Well, I won't
give up on us even if the skies get rough. I'm giving you all my love.
I'm still looking up.

*sigh* Such a good song!

3) What do you like best about setting books during the Regency period? What other historical periods intrigue you?

This is my first Regency and it definitely won't be
my last. I enjoy this time period because of how different it is from
today. It's more strict and rigid and the division between the different
classes makes for plenty of conflict between characters. So many
sources of drama and tension exist within the Regency era and makes for
perfect story fodder.

I've written a lot of medieval-inspired fantasy romances.
I've always been fascinated with the idea of knights and chivalry and
love. I already mentioned the Victorian era with my steampunk WIP. I'm
not opposed to trying a different time period either. Who knows what
I'll try next?

4) Who did you envision as you wrote Isabelle and Lord Adrian?

Henry Cavill with green eyes a la Tudors would be a perfect
Lord Adrian. Yum! As for Isabelle, she looks like Jaimie Alexander, but
with brown eyes. Very good-looking couple! ;)

Friday, October 4, 2013

I head the pleasure of reading The Long Game this summer, and it grabbed me right from page one! The characters and setting are still in my head, and I can't wait to read the sequel--J.L. Fynn, you better write fast. :)

Blurb: Smooth talking. Ambitious. Loyal. Twenty-year-old Shay Reilly has proven himself to his Irish-American Gypsy clan on small-scale cons, but now the clan leader has a bigger mission for him: playing the long game.

To rake in the big score he’s after, he needs to con co-ed Spencer into falling in love with him. He knows he should see Spencer as a mere means to an end, but that’s easier said than done when there’s a witty, attractive girl in your arms.

Now the only thing that can keep them apart is the thing that brought them together: Shay’s plans of revenge against someone who wronged his clan and family years before—Spencer’s father

About the author J.L. Fynn: J.L. Fynn is the public face of a private identity. She enjoys making up stories about iniquitous heroes, providing Delphic answers to unasked questions, and obfuscating the truth just for laughs. But then, what’s an author but a professional liar? If you send her an email she might let you in on her little secret—assuming she likes your moxie.

Wow! Today is a crazy exciting day--I've got two amazing things to share!

First up, a bit of sexy for your Friday morning...the cover reveal for THE BEST LAID PLANS (out November 12th from Swoon Romance) by my beautiful Canadian friend, Tamara Mataya.

Gah! Every time I see that cover (and really, I'm only peeking a few dozen times a day), I get, um, excited.

Excited for Tamara, right, that's what I meant.

Ahem! About the book...

Blurb:

Jayne
Griffin isn’t looking for Mr. Right. She’s looking for Mr. RTFN and a
toe-curling good time. She’s got the brains, the powerful job as a futures
broker, and thanks to a makeover and a thin book of dating advice, the
confidence to turn any man’s head.

Malcolm Black notices his high school crush, Jayne, from the
stage of her company’s work party. His adolescent feelings for her died beneath months of abuse at the
hands of bullies. Abuse that was Jayne’s fault. Though this scorching hot studio
musician is unrecognizable as the band geek he used to be, the hurt still lives
inside him, and he hatches a plan: Seduce Jayne into falling in love with him,
and then shatter her heart.

The
white-hot chemistry between them is a pleasant surprise. It all goes so
smoothly until feelings start to develop... and that invitation to their ten
year high school reunion lands in their inboxes.

Jayne
wants the perfect lover. Malcolm wants revenge. But you know what they say
about The Best Laid Plans...

Tamara Mataya is currently a librarian; she
lurked there for so long recommending books to patrons and shushing people,
that she suspects they only hired her so it would be less creepy. Now she’s
armed with a name tag, and a thin veneer of credibility. She’s also a musician
with synaesthesia – which isn't an issue until someone plays a wrong note,
which makes her want to squirm inside out. It makes for a good live show.